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Nikki Carlson / AP
Registered Nurse Patricia Rigney, right, gives Jessie James-Howley of Harlem, Mont., a flu shot.
If this year’s flu shot seemed like a bigger pain in the arm than last year’s, it might not be all in your head.
This year’s vaccine targets the same flu strains as last year’s. (That’s happened only eight times in the last 42 years.) So, thanks to some leftover antibodies from the 2010 vaccine, you might have a little more of an immune response around this year’s injection site, which could cause some tenderness, redness, and swelling, says infectious disease specialist William Schaffner, chair of preventive medicine at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville.
Don’t go thinking you can skip this year’s flu shot since it’s a repeat of last year’s, though. Immunity does wane over the course of the year, so the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urges everyone ages 6 months of age and older to get vaccinated. True, a study out Wednesday found that the flu vaccine is less effective than previously thought, but it’s the best protection we’ve got.
Live Poll
If you got a flu shot this year, tell us: Did it hurt more than usual?
If you haven’t gotten your flu shot yet, there are a few steps you could take to reduce the pain (and remember, reports that this year’s shot hurts more are not scientific, only anecdotal). You could try the new, smaller needle that injects the vaccine under the skin instead of into a muscle. Reportedly, people don’t feel a thing when it’s used. But the tiny needle’s pricier, and not all insurance plans will cover it.
Or you could take family practice doctor April Calderon’s advice. Before you go in for your flu shot, pop 400 milligrams of a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug, or NSAID, like ibuprofen (do not take it if you’re allergic or have other reasons to avoid NSAIDs).
“It will help offset some of the symptoms,” says Calderon, who practices at Scott and White’s Round Rock West Clinic in Texas.
Another thing: Try to keep your arm relaxed (I know, easier said than done). If you tense up your arm muscles, the shot might hurt more, Calderon says.
After you get your flu shot, she says, rub the injection area or move your arm around to help spread out the immune response. If necessary, an ice pack will help reduce the aching.
Of course, if you really have a thing about needles, you could inhale your flu vaccine in the form of the nasal spray called FluMist. But it’s approved only for people 2 to 49 years old, so if you’re not in that age range, you’re out of luck.
Leave a Comment:
Yes it hurt more and I seem to have gotten a splitting headache as well. But it beats the flu!
The military's been shoving these gloopy nasal secretions up our noses in recent years, no shots. Maybe they should do that to civilians.
The hour-long wait hurt far more than the shot. I noticed no physical difference myself.
Yup, it hurt more this year and it hurt longer. A week later and still a tender spot. Either it was the shot or the nurse who jabbed it into me. If you give me a lollipop I promise to stop crying.
Me too. I've never thought about the shot once I'd gotten it, but this year, it's still sore to the touch after 5 days. Didn't feel the shot at all, so I was surprised the next day when it was sore.
Phew! I thought it was just me turning into a wimp!
Many of the comments on this page are selfish, only thinking of yourself.
Immunizations are not only for individuals; they provide herd immunity, e.g. greater protection for a group of people. Even if your immune system is super-strong and YOU can fight off the flu virus, you can still pass it on to children, the elderly, or the ill. Same thing if you're unable to get vaccinated: it's even more important to those around you to get the flu shot so there's less chance of them passing the flu on to you.
Yes, there are key things to know, such as the different between the weakened live virus given as a nasal spray to young adults vs. the shot given to older adults and the chronically ill. And yes, not everyone develops sufficient immunity to the flu viruses included in this year's vaccine. Plus, flu vaccines cannot protect much again flu viruses that have mutated since this year's vaccine was formulated and produced.
But large, repeated studies worldwide prove that it's better for almost everyone to get vaccinated again the major strains of flu every year. And that's the medical advice I'll follow, despite the inconvenience and minor discomfort of getting the shot.
There are numerous diseases, some dangerous, that transmit through contact or through the air, so wash your hands frequently, use hand sanitizer if washing isn't practical, cover your coughs in your sleeve or a tissue, clean surfaces and door handles, and don't fall into the trap of thinking that illness will not happen to you.
You're parroting points you've heard before from the pro mass vaccine propaganda but never seriously thought about. For the elderly and immunocompromised (90%+ of complications) this shot works about 30% of the time at best. Many times not at at all. For the healthy population who generally do no have complications from flu this shot works for 1.5 out of 100 recipients. That is not going to get you heard immunity. Especially when the expert officials cry that rates need to be a close to 100 percent as possible. Flu deaths have not budged inspite of increased uptake in influenza vacceine. Herd immunity is an illusion for this vaccine. It's a good altruistic marketing point for Pharma though.
You first spell it "heard" immunity, proving yet again your ignorance of the scientific field of public health. You've proved repeatedly with your comments that you are selfishly ignorant of greater public health issues and quality medical research.
Guess you've never volunteered and worked for local or global health organizations giving life-saving vaccines to grateful people. I'm not "Pharma," I'm an international public health volunteer with advanced degrees and experience in epidemiology research and biostatistics.
Enough said. It's not worth reading or responding to people who believe that saying things again and again, spouting illogical and ill-informed analysis, makes them any more right.
If you have nothing to really say you can always be pedantic.
Uh, that would be a negative.
Do you personally follow up on those people and find out what type of side effect damage you're causing? I'm sure you give them full informed consent.
They usually say you have to get an annual shot because the strains mutate. Now they are saying it's because immunity wanes. In LESS than a year? That's not very reassuring. Especially in light of this weeks article that says the shot works in about 50% of healthy people and way less in elderly and immunocompromised.
I wonder what they'll say next year?
The reason that you need to get a flu shot every year is because the strains mutate. That is also why the shot is not 100% effective. The developers of the vaccine don't know what strain will be circulating each year. And they can't know. Viruses are very "smart" and their way of survival is to constantly change their genetic makeup so that their target hosts will have no prior immunity to them. It takes far too long to develop a vaccine and produce mass quantities of it for the researchers to wait until now (the beginning of flu season) to begin the development process. Yes, the vaccine would probably be more effective against this year's particular strain, but nobody would get vaccinated at all. They have ways of predicting what may be circulating and oftentimes base the vaccine partly on the previous year's strains. And, yes, immunity wanes. Also, immunity varies person to person.
I also think the statement "a study out Wednesday found that the flu vaccine is less effective than previously thought, but it’s the best protection we’ve got" to be somewhat irresponsible. People should get a flu shot because it is the best way to make sure that people have some immunity to the virus, but the BEST protection against the flu and many other viruses and bacteria is simply hygiene and common sense. Wash your hands thoroughly and often. Stay home from work or school (I know sometimes this isn't always possible) if you are sick. Cover your mouth. With these practices, aided by a flu vaccine, your chances of getting the flu are much smaller.
Robert is correct.
Kerry is correct.
Robert that's the problem with getting your daily dose of science education from a staff reporter who's last science course was highschool Intro to Biology.
Also, if you are going to quote stats, try quoting the right one (60%, not 50%...when you are talking about 300million Americans that 10% makes a big difference).
Strains mutate, immunity wanes, and every person on the planet is different genetically. There are so many physiologic, anatomic, and pharmacokinetic reasons to get annual booster shots they cannot all be reported in one article and take a solid background/foundation in life science to understand anyways. You don't need to understand it for it to be true. For example, I don't understand quantum mechanics but I have no doubt that matter is made of atoms. Please, place more faith in researchers that have spent decades educating themselves, rather than a staff reporter that gives half the story.
Wow. so many reasons you can't even name one so it can be argued and disputed.
You are saying that getting a flu shot is self evident that no explanation needed. That's not true at all. The science says that getting a flu shot is uncertainty.
Sorry but you're going to need more than pleading an argument from authority.
The flu shot protects 1.5 out of 100 healthy users. That's not a very confident vaccine. most everyone stands a good chance without the vaccine.
I named three in the sentence juuuuuust before the one you chose to single out. Here are a few more: innate immune cells lack TLRs to complement bind virus, memory T-cell differentiation is specific to a single antigen, effectiveness of IM vs. Intra-nasal delivery methods. It is very evident that you do not understand what you are talking about, but rather you pick and choose passages to support whatever claim you want to make.
The science, including a recent review of 31 independent studies, disagrees with you.
Sorry, but it's sad and downright dangerous to believe what staff reporter says in a 1-page article over bodies of peer-reviewed scientific evidence spanning decades.
So your argument is, why should we try to protect 45 million people? After all, they only represent 1.5% of the US population. Perhaps you prefer the days when the flu killed an average of 41,000 people per year?
MmmMmmBeer: Good points.
But 1.5% of the U.S. population is 4.5 million. Also not everyone gets a flu shot. I think about 100 million get it every year, so the vaccine prevents 1.5 million flu cases a year on average, according to data from that study. Still a big number, especially when compared to the number of people who experience severe reactions to the shot.
oops you are right, missed a zero in my head!
What's sad is you not knowing that the studied population, the healthy, are not at high risk for complications of influenza. And for the at risk population the shot even works less.
So your argument is, why should we try to protect 45 million people?
No.
After all, they only represent 1.5% of the US population. Perhaps you prefer the days when the flu killed an average of 41,000 people per year?
You mean that modeled number that included pneumonia which has many causes. And you mean the steady 40,000 number used year after year no matter how much flu vaccine was used or if the strains were ineffective. Did that ever make you question?
Or did you stop and think that 90% of the 40,000 was in the elderly which the shot does not work very good if at all. (that's why they have devised the high dose vaccine). The rest compromised a mixture of those with comorbidities. Did you stop and think that the numbers this article is talking about is in the healthy.
Stop letting "experts" through a controlled campaign tell you what and how to think. Decide for yourself. stop getting caught up in cliches, buzzwords, and slogans.
Maybe some people just like the idea of a flu shot. It makes them feel all warm and fuzzy inside. They feel secure from the fabricated danger.
reports year to year range from 3,300 to 49,000. The overall average from 1970's to 2001 was 41,000 per year. Again you are only trying to manipulate numbers. These people are DEAD. Do you get that? This disease virus people. And up to 60% could have been prevented.
Buddy, I don't let experts tell me what to think and decide. I luckily have a solid foundation in life science, I have done my own research for thesis and am capable of interpreting data that I, or anyone else, generates. I read more than the "Abstract" when gleaning information from peer reviewed sources. In any case, after reading the volumes of comments that dispute pretty much everything you say, it's clear the majority understand why prevention is necessary. MmmMmmBeer out, it's happy hour!
Stop drinking beer and use your brain. The CDC lumps pneumonia and influenza deaths together. If you can find the table where they are seperated, you'll see that 98% are actually pneumonia deaths. Pneumonia has many many causes. Influenza may be one of them. To say that 60% can be avoided is speculative ignorance.
Now if you dig a little deeper you'll find that 90% of THOSE deaths are in the elderly. The other 10% are also most likely high risk cases. The vaccine doesn't work at or works very poorly in this group. To use numbers extrapolated from healthy populations to say the 60% of deaths can be prevented is overconfidently ignorant.
The 59% number is cases not deaths. And it is in the group that has mild cases and few complications. Again you've been fooled to believe something is true. You have believed the simplistic vaccine propaganda message "vaccines save lives". It's not that straight forward, my little buzzed buddy.
Any more questions or emotional claims? Flu campaigns are propaganda made for the weak. Be strong. You should be pissed at the CDC and the people who lie about the flu vaccine every year. If you want I'll post the "recipe used to get you "joe beer drinking public" to demand flu vaccine.
Calm down. clear your head. Think about the situation and the supposed solution. You remind me of someone from a movie!
I shouldn't but...
Robert, 90% of flu deaths every year are elderly patients--that's about 36,000 elderly flu deaths. Yes the flu vaccine has lower effectiveness in this population--it's maybe around 30% effective for them. So if 36,000 elderly people die from the flu every year, about 10,000 of them are preventable from the flu. (And yes I realize not all of them die from the flu directly. But pneumonia is a common secondary infection caused by the flu, especially in patients with weaker immune systems.)
Do those deaths matter? You can't honestly believe that the flu vaccine prevents zero deaths.
You see your absurd rhetoric continues to wave the numbers of the few people injured or killed by vaccines as reprehensible. But what about the preventable deaths caused by these viruses?
You tell us to stop weighing the safety of the herd against the collateral damage to the few. But that means you continually ignore preventable deaths in far larger numbers. So you may like to think that the anti-vaccine position is the moral one that doesn't injure or kill people, but I think if you look at the stats with an objective eye, you'll see a larger body count on the preventable illness side.
Also for someone who ignores basic science supported by decades of research and the vast majority of scientists in the field, you might want to skip the condescending tone. You think your contrarian views are a sign of independent thinking and wisdom, but often times the people like you are just ignorant of reality.
So if 36,000 elderly people die from the flu every year, about 10,000 of them are preventable from the flu.
No. Now you have to prove those pneumonia deaths were first caused by the influenza virus. You can't it's impossible from the data given. I'll speculate it was done that way on purpose. But I know for a fact that your speculation can't be proven because those number aren't confirmed numbers.
Any more conclusion drawn from this speculation would be flawed.
If we didn't vaccinate for influenza how much do you think the deaths would rise? Choose your answer carefully and state if it's speculation or evidence.
Research has just concluded that the vast majority of scientists and doctors who said the flu vaccine was 90% effective were ignorantly lying. They arrogantly spread false information that skewed the benefit/risk ratio for people who make intelligent decisions. The never were 90% effective.
If scientists are wrong is still really scientific fact?
Robert: "Research has just concluded that the vast majority of scientists and doctors who said the flu vaccine was 90% effective were ignorantly lying. They arrogantly spread false information that skewed the benefit/risk ratio for people who make intelligent decisions. "
1) Provide a link to that research. And don't post anything from crack pot sites like Natural News.
2) If they were ignorant, they weren't lying, so the phrase "ignorantly lying" is inaccurate. Also if they were ignorant of the real data, then how do you get to the "arrogantly" description?
Basically those two sentences perfectly sum up the ideological drone that you are. "Doctors are out to get you everyone!!" Right and the snake oil salesmen and pseudoscience hacks that fight against vaccines are in it for purely benign reasons. They aren't trying to profit from spreading baseless doubt in modern medicine so they could sell "all-natural" snake oil remedies. No way.
I shouldn't have jumped back in to debate with you, it only makes my blood pressure jump.
You're getting so caught up on the ideology of vaccination that you're losing point. I'm not saying "nobody should be able to vaccinate". Those elderly can vaccinate until the cows come home but with such a poor vaccine for them and all the other comorbidities that the high risk people have, it doesn't make a difference.
The evidence is clear. Increasing vaccination rates dramatically in the elderly hasn't budged the flu mortality. Not even an hmmph.
The problem will vaccine ideology is they want EVERYBODY to uptake the pharma product but they wan't all benefit. If you try to sell vaccines to one group of people to benefit the other it's plain and simply unethical. healthy people don't need the flu vaccine. The elderly and sick do but it doesn't make a difference.
You can't honestly believe that the flu vaccine prevents zero deaths.
I'm sure it prevents a death somewhere in somebody, but science can't tell you who it and who it didn't. You can only have a faith like belief that science says it was you.
A nurse told me that 3 of her nurse coworkers contracted guillain barre at her hospital. I trust her. That's a high number. Just like they were motivated to overstate the effectivenss. I think they also underestimate the serious adverse events. And I have reason to believe so.
I got mine about 2 weeks ago and never had an issue with injection pain until this year. My wife mentioned her's from 3 days ago still hurt. We compared notes. Same thing.
(They must have used a needle this loooooooong?)
You know, I actually felt the needle a bit this time, but there's less swelling than last year... guess I'm the wierd one... :)
Flu vaccines only prevent the flu in 1.5 out of every 100 adults injected with the vaccine!
Now Robert, how can they possibly know that? You'd have to give 100 people the shot, then deliberately expose them to the virus to find out. Not very ethical.
Read the ARTICLE!
it hurts like the dickins for about a week, at least my wife and me thought so
Holy cow, Robert. Can you be any more misleading.
1) You're citing a news article from a pseudoscience news source: Natural News. Talk about bias. Let's look at the second sentence in the first paragraph: "Yet, predictably, this report is being touted by the quack science community, the vaccine-pushing CDC and the scientifically-inept mainstream media as proof that "flu vaccines are 60% effective!"" They clearly have an agenda.
2) Yes the flu vaccine prevents the flu in 1.5 people out of 100 people who get the shot. But it's also true that 2.7 of those 100 people get the flu--that's how we arrive at the 50-60% effectiveness number. So to say that the flu vaccine is 50-60% effective isn't misleading it's friggin' true! It's called math.
If 2.7 people get the flu out of 100 people who don't get the shot, and 1.2 people get the flu out of 100 people who do get the shot, then the shot prevents 55% of the flu cases, hence 55% effective.
It's not a lie: It's math.
The article goes on to say this: "flu vaccines do nothing in 98.5% of adults"
That is a misleading and scientifically incorrect statement. What that Lancet study showed was that in a group of 100 people, about 97.3 don't come in contact with the flu. Say all 100 of those people got the shot. That statistic doesn't mean the vaccine didn't do anything for those people, they never came into contact with the virus so the vaccine didn't get a chance to do their job.
Based on the results of this study, if every one in a group of 100 people came in contact with the flu and all of them had received the shot, then 55 of them wouldn't get sick.
Basically, your article, like most of your posts on here, is inaccurate and misleading and dishonest.
Robert: Simple math question for ya -- what percentage of 2.7 is 1.5?
Actually, if you read the article Robert provided, it states that over 97% of the unvaccinated did NOT get the flu; only 2.7% of the unvaccinated DID get the flu. Compare this to the vaccinated group where only 1.2% did NOT get the flu; simple math would tell us that 98.8% of the vaccinated group DID get the flu. So who go the flu, according to this article? 2.7% of the UNVACCINATED and 98.8% of the VACCINATED. Whether or not the article correctly recaps the study, I don't know. Just thought I'd point this out...
LTC: No it doesn't say that 98.8 of the vaccinated people got the flu.
Also the article in the Lancet isn't a study, it's a meta-analysis of 31 different studies. So they should have explained which study they're getting their numbers from.
Relative risk is not ACTUAL risk. It's misleading. The fact is, according to this research, you have a 97% chance of NOT getting the flu. Who cares how good a vaccine is? It's pretty much not needed by the 98.5% who take it.
So you admit that the vaccine is 55% effective, according to those numbers? Yes or no?
Does the Vaccine Matter?
If you could predict who would get the flu and only address them then you could be honest and more closer to accuracy with risks. But until you can do that saying the vaccine is 55% effective in preventing flu to the general public is dishonest and misleading.
You need to go back to the pro mass vaccination/skeptic based medicine boards and get some help. You're not doing so well arguing your case here. The vaccine doesn't work very well for the public and it certainly doesn't do very good with the ones it could potentially help the most.
Robert: Same tired arguments about mortality rates. Dude, people don't want to get sick, even if that sickness isn't life-threatening.
I have asthma, not bad asthma. I've never had an attack that was life-threatening. But I still take non-steroidal preventative drugs and have an inhaler with me. Why? Because I don't like wheezing. My life is better because I don't experience the symptoms of asthma on a regular basis, even if those symptoms have never been life-threatening.
If you're going to rant and rave that vaccination is pointless because we're only preventing people from getting sick, and not preventing death, then you're missing the point of progress. Everyone wants to improve their standard of living. If scientists could find a way to remove flu season from our lives, people would jump at it. Simple fact.
Could you cite this study for me? No. You're just speculating. Everyone who comes into contact with flu viruses do not express clinical disease.
You're showing a good job of fooling yourself. IF you gave 100 people an antibiotic to prevent a serious infection and it was only shown to prevent 1 infection. Would you say the antibiotic was still effective in the 99 other people. Even though a certain amount also experienced diarrhea, anaphylaxis, yeast infection, etc., Would you still hold to the mantra that the antibiotic was effective for something that didn't exist? Do you see how sill you sound? It's absurd.
"If you could predict who would get the flu and only address them then you could be honest and more closer to accuracy with risks. But until you can do that saying the vaccine is 55% effective in preventing flu to the general public is dishonest and misleading."
Seriously? So then should we stop wearing seat belts in cars? Say seatbelts are 55% effective at preventing death and serious injury in car crashes--I don't know what the real number is, but let's make it 55% for sake of argument.
There are about 10 million car accidents a year in the U.S. If 2.7% of a non-vaccinated population gets the flu in a season, and there are about 300 million people in the U.S., then about 8 million people would get the flu every year without the vaccine. So the incidence of the flu would be roughly the same as the incidence of car accidents.
But who knows if you're going to be the one getting into an accident. By your reasoning, since we can't know that answer, why bother with seat belts.
" IF you gave 100 people an antibiotic to prevent a serious infection and it was only shown to prevent 1 infection."
But that is not the comparable scenario. Say 100 people have a bacterial infection. About 97 of them will clear up the infection without help. Without an antibiotic 3, will die. With the drug, 1.5 will die. That drug is 50% effective at preventing mortality from this infection.
What does the 1.5 in 100 number translate into actual numbers? The flu vaccine prevents 4.5 million cases of the flu every year (1.5% of 300 million).
Look you can spin the numbers all you want. But the simple fact is that the vaccine prevents the flu and people don't like getting the flu. And it does it relatively risk free--yeah yeah you don't accept that, but that's because you beleive everything you read on pseudoscience web sites.
Logical fallacy. No where did imply we shouldn't wear seatbelts. It uses false logic to come to this conclusion. Also..
Seat belt analogy doesn't work here. Though it is commonly used by the more naive pro mass vaccine debaters. I don't have pay $25 dollars everytime I click on my seatbeal and I don't have any chance of the seatbelt causing an adverse like a seizure just by clicking it on in my driveway. If people could get a serious adverse reaction in their driveway before even driving the car then I'm sure many people would also forgo wearing their seatbelts. (adverse reactions with vaccines occur before people are even given a chance to be exposed)
Nice try with the seatbelt analogy. It's been debunked. You like that word? Debunked? Skeptics love it.
Your really not paying attention here. 300 million people don't get the flu vaccine. Could you provide sold scientific studies that show the flu vaccine prevents 4.5 million cases every year?
Face it. The flu vaccine is crap. You can believe in it and wish for it to work really hard if that makes you feel better.
You just keep worshipping at the alter. You've been duped.
Vaccines for preventing influenza in the elderly
Jefferson T, Di Pietrantonj C, Al-Ansary LA, Ferroni E, Thorning S, Thomas RE
Authors' conclusions
The available evidence is of poor quality and provides no guidance regarding the safety, efficacy or effectiveness of influenza vaccines for people aged 65 years or older. To resolve the uncertainty, an adequately powered publicly-funded randomised, placebo-controlled trial run over several seasons should be undertaken.
@whatever: Okay. Well, here's a quote from the article:
So if only 1.2% did NOT catch the flu (according to this article), what happened with the other 98.8%? (Remember, now, 100% - 1.2% = 98.8%.) Maybe they...what?...vaporized or something?
LTC: The article continually hammers the same point: The flu vaccine only prevents 1.5 flu cases in 100 people getting the shot. That number is based on the fact that the baseline rate of flu incidence is 2.7 people out of 100. So in any population, 97.3% don't get the flu with or without the shot. Now you add in the shot and an additional 1.5% don't get the flu.
Robert: Seatbelts aren't without risks. It slows your escape from a car. It can choke small children in accidents. The risks are extremely low, albeit. But the risk isn't zero.
Similarly vaccines are low risk. Yes they cause seizures, but in very rare cases.
Look this is pointless now. We keep rehashing the same points over and over again.
I still think you're a nut job. And you still think I'm brain-washed. Shall we leave it at that?
whatever...
Whatever: You state "So to say that the flu vaccine is 50-60% effective isn't misleading it's friggin' true! It's called math." But you also say "Yes the flu vaccine prevents the flu in 1.5 people out of 100 people who get the shot", Which is all that Robert ever said! So, how can Robert be misleading? What he said is friggin' true! You say so yourself!
You also claim that the statement: "flu vaccines do nothing in 98.5% of adults" is scientifically incorrect, when in fact it is correct based on the statistics given. The vaccines do absolutely nothing for anyone who doesn't come into contact with the virus, just like chemotherapy and radiationtherapy do absolutely nothing for (but would do a lot of harm to) anyone who doesn't have cancer.
If cancer had the same statistics, the statement "treatment does nothing for 98.5% of adults" would still be true, but would be misleading because only those with cancer ever get treated. And the statement "the treatment is 50%-60% effective" would not be misleading.
But the Flu vaccine is designed for everyone, and not just those who would get the flu. So in that case the statement "only 1.5% benefit" is less misleading than " it's 50%-60% effective". This is even more true when comparing to the rate of adverse effects which can only be given in terms of all those treated.
It would seem that YOU are the one with the agenda (the authors of the article no doubt have one as well, they too are somewhat misleading)- or maybe your logic circuits are fried?
Am I the only one who senses Robert has an agenda?
Yes, you are the only one.
I have an agenda. The CDC has an agenda. What's yours? To be a poor mediocre victim and then conclude "I guess that's just the way the world is"?
Seat belt analogy is perfectly valid. You have a very small risk of getting hurt by your seatbelt or it restraining you if your car is on fire. Small chance of getting into an accident but, when you get into an accident, the seat belt value goes up considerably. Robert is trying to be misleading with his numbers. He's missing the simple fact that when looking at such numbers, we can't really compare the prevented cases to the total number of patients because not everyone is exposed to or gets the disease. That's not a valid comparison and no statistician will tell you it's useful when talking about the effectiveness of a treatment. If you were to compare cancer medication, you would compare it in individuals with cancer. If an individual didn't have cancer and you gave them the treatment, you wouldn't really put that into your stats for measuring how effective the treatment was. Since vaccines are preventative, you can't wait for them to get the flu and then see how effective the treatment is, so, the next best comparison is between groups of people that did and did not get the flu and look at the difference in the group.
Also, something Robert forgot in his statement about 98% of people not needing the flu vaccine. Herd immunity has a huge effect on people not getting the flu when they don't get a flu shot. This would have an effect on the test subjects that didn't receive the flu vaccine. So, if you're going to nitpick other people's arguments for things like relative risk vs actual risk or try to say someone is using a logical fallacy without actually showing the problem with the anology.... you should really clean up your own argument first. http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/03/09/us-flu-children-idUSTRE6284PX20100309
Whatever isn't making a logical fallacy with his seat belt argument.... he's simply using Robert's same logic and demonstrating the absurdity of Robert's point. Robert doesn't actually have to mention anything to do at all with seat belts for people to see Whatever's point.
Fortunately for the rest of us, science isn't run by Robert....
Herd immunity is not going to work when you have a vaccine as $hitty and uncertain as the flu vaccine.
He did make a logical fallacy. he created a straw man argument and then deconstructed the argument that HE made. It's dishonest. If you'd like to go through the logic step by step then I can point out the flaws in you own logic. It's quite possible that you use these types of fallacious reasonings yourself and are unable to recognize them in others. if you've ever been in an argument and said "wait I didn't say that" chances are the person used a strawman argument against you. It's decietful logic and logically unsound.
If an individual didn't have cancer and you gave them the treatment, you wouldn't really put that into your stats for measuring how effective the treatment was.
You need to start thinking for yourself instead of just parroting what others tell you to think.
You asking the wrong question. The question is "do I need a flu shot?' Not is it effective. If a treatment is 100% effective yet 100% not needed then it is useless. No matter how good it fights nonexistent delusions. Do you understand that.
On top of that the flu shot has side effects. Some of them serious. It would be a tragedy for someone to experience that when most likely they never would have the flu or it's complications in the first place.
No the argument was not a straw one. He took an analogy argument to yours and showed how the logic you used lead to a moronic conclusion. He used your logic which was basically, "there are so few cases of the flu that protecting against it doesn't matter" and showed how it's stupid with seat belts. You're basically trying to argue that something that has a small chance of occurring doesn't need to be protected against. His argument is that the value of that protection goes up considerably when you end up in that @!$%#ty situation. Plain and simple really. We see again that you say "do you need a flu shot?" Again one asks "do you need to wear a seatbelt?" You have less of a chance of getting into a car accident then you do of getting the flu so by using your logic of "not needed because you have a small chance of a bad outcome" would dictate that seat belts are as useless as flu shots.
See, what's most striking about the anti-vaccination crowd is that they flip what's suddenly important in their analysis. They first talk about how a 3% chance of getting the flu isn't much at all and therefor you shouldn't get vaccinated. But then when you ask them, "well why not, the protection is good protection for little cost", they go into a tirade about the side effects such as the dreaded Guillain–Barré syndrome. But, if you look closely they've change the logic of their original statement. Estimates put getting this syndrome from the flu at around 1 per million injections or 1 in 10 million injections.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guillain%E2%80%93Barr%C3%A9_syndrome
If we go back to those tiny percents again we get 0.0001%. Well now, that's quite a bit smaller when compared to 1.5% isn't it. But suddenly that 0.0001% is now the most important thing in the world as opposed to the 3% chance of getting the flu and the improvement from 3 to 1.5% with the vaccine. This shows most sane people that the anti-vaccine crowd doesn't really think about these things all that much...
Also, your arguments don't seem to have any real substance other than parroting what anti-vaccine websites say. As a matter of fact, a simple Google search for anti-vaccine website, will give you all sorts of names and phrases like "Think twice", or" think for yourself", or "don't parrot what the pharmaceutical companies tell you". You also seem to be ignoring research provided in the links. You ignored the article demonstrating that herd immunity does have a significant effect when compared to no herd immunity. Saying "Herd immunity isn't going to work when you have vaccine as crappy as the flu vaccine" doesn't really negate that research. I'm going to trust the researchers that performed the study on this one as opposed to the person typing things out on the vine. They put more effort into their research.
Saying "it's 100% not needed" is false. 100% not needed would mean that no one gets or dies from the flu. According to your own numbers 3% get the flu and, according to publicly available numbers, 0.01% of those die from it. Now, 3% may not seem like all that much in the same way 1.5% isn't all that much. However, if you have 1.5% of 300M that number becomes 4.5M, and is quite a bit more important then 1.5%. If you're going to try to nitpick other people's arguments, making statements that contradict your previous ones or that are false don't really help your argument.
On a final note, let's say we remove the flu vaccine completely for oh... 20 years. We see from the previous article that you nearly double the rate of flu without herd immunity so that puts us at between 6-7% infection rate. This is opposed to say a 1.5% rate with the vaccine. We can figure out a ballpark estimate of your chance of getting the flu over the next 20 years. For simplicity we'll assume your chance is the same from year to year. Not perfect, but since we're ballparking things and doing a comparison, we don't really need exact values to demonstrate the point. So, with no vaccine, your chance of getting the flu in the year is .94 (we'll be generous and say herd immunity only reduces the rate of infection by half). Not getting it 2 years in a row is 0.94*0.94. 3 years is 0.94^3. Take it to 20 and we get the chance of not getting the flu as 0.94^20=~30%. Do this for with the vaccine and we have the rough estimate of not getting the flu at 0.985^20=~74%. More then double your chances of the good outcome. Now, let's see what the chance of getting the nasty side effect we talked about earlier. One time, 0.999999 chance of not getting Guillain–Barré syndrome. Do this for 20 years and we get 0.99998 chance of not getting this horrible syndrome over 20 years of getting the vaccine. So, let's say that we vaccinate everyone in the country for 20 years. With our ballpark estimate we'd get around 6000 cases of Guillain–Barré syndrome over 20 years but prevent around (1.5%*300M)*20 years = 90,000,000 cases of the flu and upwards of 9000 deaths. Granted population will change over time, treatments and incidence of both disease can change per year. But, the magnitude difference of preventing 90M cases of the flu vs 6k cases of Guillain–Barré syndrome certainly seems like a good deal. And that's using the high end estimate for Guillain–Barré syndrome. If we used the lower end of 1 in 10M we're getting about 600 cases of Guillain–Barré syndrome for 90M cases of the flu... Once again vaccines win. This analysis doesn't take into account other seriously adverse side effects but the estimate of only 3% of cases without the vaccine is a low end estimate. Some estimates put % of people that get the flu at between 5-20%. So, rates of a serious side effect for allergies or Alzheimer's better be pretty high to get anywhere near the order of magnitude for preventable flu cases (We're talking on the order of 1% of people that get the flu shot have a deadly allergic reaction to it or develop Alzheimer's).
Excellent post. Said it better than I had.
And that is why it's a strawman argument right there. Everything you say after that based on his analogy is flawed.
Most people are protected from the flu and it's consequences without the need for a flu shot. You are portraying that if people don't get the flu shot it is the same as leaving them unprotected.
And another strawman. I didn't say no one gets the flu or the flu shot is 100% not needed. Nice try though. Strawman arguments are dishonest attempts or argument. In formal debate if you use them you automatically lose even if you're right.
http://nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html
The Straw Man fallacy is committed when a person simply ignores a person's actual position and substitutes a distorted, exaggerated or misrepresented version of that position. This sort of "reasoning" has the following pattern:
This sort of "reasoning" is fallacious because attacking a distorted version of a position simply does not constitute an attack on the position itself. One might as well expect an attack on a poor drawing of a person to hurt the person.
Examples of Straw Man
You are as emotional of a thinker than whatever is. You should try critically analyzing your beliefs instead of assuming and making up conclusions and arguements based on false premises.
It's also a faulty benefit to risk value assesment because seatbelts unlike vaccines do not harm one when they are not called into use. Seatbelts cause no harm when while just trying them out or wearing them during normal driving.
Vaccines on the other hand injure their victims before the person is ever given a chance to be exposed to anything. If people knew there was a chance to get convulsive febrile seizures, paralysis, brain damage, or death just by clicking the seatlbelt on. Then I think it would be reasonable and understanding if people were to forgo seatbelts or hesitant to put them on.
Your numbers are wrong because your sloppy thinking has failed to consider the age groups studied. But it doesn't matter. even if 4 million HEALTHY people got the flu it would be RARE for them to suffer serious consequences. This is the group the study included. Not the sick and elderly.
Details. Critical thinking. Slow down absorb. You draw faulty conclusions too fast.
Oh, instead of putting out a large paragraph of theory, speculation assumptions and wrong numbers why don't you just provide the citation to back up your speculation? You should be able to do a lit search to support this.
Massive increase in flu shot uptake did not budge mortality figures in the elderly. The overwhelming majority of flu deaths. There is no good scientific data supporting herd immunity with the flu shot. The flu shot sucks.
"You are as emotional of a thinker than whatever is. " says the man who talks about how he knows scientists would twist data to support the HPV vaccine, the guy who calls people sheep for listening to experts who have studied the field for decades.
You can get as many flu vaccines with as many strains as you feel will spell your delusions that you absolutely need them. But there is plenty of scientific evidence to show that they aren't necessary and plenty of scientific uncertainty to show they may not work. If you feel you personally still need the shot to survive in this world, then have at it.
Robert if you had bothered to actually read and understand what I wrote, you would have seen that I told you in the post that this was a ballpark estimate...
Here's the key point. You missed the citations given. I gave you citations with regards to the article on the syndrome.... if you would have actually bothered to read it you would have found the numbers in the article. See that's called citing things. What's not called citing things is saying things like "Massive increase in flu shot uptake did not budge mortality figures in the elderly." Or, "There is no good scientific data supporting herd immunity with the flu shot. The flu shot sucks." despite showing you a study in the previous post. Finally, you did say the "is 100% not needed", perhaps you should read your previous post. As a matter of fact your exact words were "If a treatment is 100% effective yet 100% not needed then it is useless." I'm pretty sure you're talking about the flu shot treatment but seeing as you've contradicted yourself, several times, said you didn't type out something you did, and like to complain about lack of citations while never giving any of your own... I suppose it's possible that you decided to talk about another type of treatment as opposed to the flu shot...
Here's what you fail to understand. Here was your statement "If a treatment is 100% effective yet 100% not needed then it is useless." So, let's go through this slowly now. You must believe that the treatment is "100% not needed". There are only two ways this would be the case. The treatment is 100% ineffective. We see clear contradictions to this in studies cited previously and in this and the other article regarding the vaccine not being as effective as previously thought. We also have your own posts demonstrating at least a 50% shift in effectiveness. Going from 2.7% to 1.5% is about 50%. So by your own posting you can't believe that it's 100% ineffective. So, the only other possibility of your statement being correct would be no one actually caught the flu. See, the difference between an analysis of someone's argument and a strawman counter argument is that in a strawman argument you put something that is not directly derived from the statement made. We just directly derived two things from your statement. One was false by your own admission previously, and the other was absurd. No meaning was actually changed in the derivation, hence different from a strawman argument. It's ok though, most people fail to understand the subtle difference. It's not suprising that you made this error seeing as you try to say you didn't say things when we have a previous posting of you saying exactly that...
Furthermore, using logic, theory, and speculation is exactly what you do because data isn't available for the next 20 years. This is how you assess something's predicted benefit and demonstrate estimates of its usefulness and compare it to not having it. If you actually worked in a scientific field, you would know this because performing such an experiment would be far too expensive or pointless when you can perform a much smaller one and extrapolate for very accurate predictions.
Here's another example of your faulty logic system. You claim that age groups were not considered and that adverse reactions to the flu shot would effect them more but what you fail to see is that the elderly are at a much high risk of dying of the flu when getting it. Once again, number for chance of dying or getting extremely sick from the flu are far higher then all estimates of the probability of having an adverse side effect. This was shown in the previous citation for Guillain–Barré syndrome which you clearly didn't actually read.... So, your nitpicking about age not being included is rather silly seeing as you neglected it yourself.
It's pointless trying to educate you. I give you citations, you ignore them, I show you how you've contradicted yourself and say you didn't, I demonstrate the difference between an analysis of someone's argument and a strawman counterargument and you sit there with your ears plugged.
For Whatever, it's pointless trying to argue with Robert. He will consistently claim that you didn't make a point or that he didn't type something for which you have his exact quote. Instead of trying to counter your argument, he will then try to win points with the audience by claiming you should think for yourself. He'll also take the evidence from studies and try to claim that evidence doesn't exist but then get upset with you when you don't cite everything. If he was in a debate he would get hammered by doing such things. He would be penalize especially for claiming that he didn't say something when we have a transcripts of him saying it....
Just be thankful that individuals like Robert aren't in charge of scientific research. They usually get weeded out rather quickly due to their inability to follow logic within an argument, faulty statements they make and then deny, or their insistence on running impossible experiments.
Here's an example of how analysis of what someone says is different from the strawman argument.
Bill and Jill are arguing about cleaning out their closets: Jill: "We should clean out the closets. They are getting a bit messy." Bill: "Why, we just went through those closets last year. Do we have to clean them out everyday?" Jill: "I never said anything about cleaning them out every day. You just want too keep all your junk forever, which is just ridiculous."
That's a strawman
Bill and Jill are arguing about cleaning out their closets: Jill: "We should clean out the closets. They are getting a bit messy." Bill: "So, there is a pile of dirty cloths in the closet, you want me to get them out of the closet".
That's not a strawman because Bill used Jill's statement to derive a direct meaning.
Here's another one
"Senator Jones says that we should not fund the attack submarine program. I disagree entirely. I can't understand why he wants to leave us defenseless like that."
Strawman
"Senator Jones says that we should not fund the attack submarine program. I disagree entirely. I can't understand why he wants to remove funding that will build an attack submarine next year."
Not a strawman.
For everyone else, see if you can make up one of your own. Show one that is and is not a strawman argument and point out the difference.
Here's a hint, strawman arguments give different meanings to what a person said as opposed to deriving the meaning directly from the statement without additional meaning.
Not sheep for listening to experts. Sheep for not thinking and just blindly doing what these "experts" say to do. They are essentially making medical and ethical judgements for people they have never seen. It's one size fit's all medicine in spite that most people will not get sick or have complications and there is uncertainty about the efficacy and safety.
They don't say "hey here's the information(actually they give pointed information designed for compliance not education). It's up to you if you want to get vaccinated". They say "You are a selfish idiot if you don't get vaccinated and you may die!. Hardly scientific. Far from the truth. The message is clear. It's a hypnotic "get your damn vaccine".
@dog
About strawmen, he's implying that anyone who forgoes a vaccine is akin to one not wearing a seatbelt because the risk/benefit is similar. They are not. He is implying that it would be foolish to not wear a seatbelt therefore it would be foolish to not vaccinate. He's claiming he superimposed my logic to come to this conclusion and that I must also reject seatbelt use based on this logic. This is false based on above faulty analogy. Because of your position you also fail to see the logic error. You simply agree with his stance on mass vaccination.
Seatbelts do not inherently cause convulsive febrile seizures. Seatbelts do not work or cause risk until called upon during an MVA. Vaccines can damage before the person even had a fighting chance. They can even kill a person who most likely would have resisted clinical disease or serious sequelae. Seatbelts don't kill in the driveway.
Nope. YOu derived that using your own logic. What I said above is absolutely 100% true no matter what the treatment is. If a treatment is 100% not needed then it doesn't matter how effective it is. I have not contradicted myself not one single time. It is only your perspective that allows you to come to such a conclusion. It is only contradictory according to your orientiation and your prior assumptions.
If you're running the bath water for you child and he/she screams to make it warmer. What would you automatically do? Turn on more hot water? And what if the child screams even louder? what would you make of that? What if he/she actually meant that the water was too hot and they wanted it less hot which is warm. Your false assumption would cause you to burn your child. You see, in many cases, there are more possibilities of logic than your own narrow minded views.
For Robert, you're trying to make an ethical and medical judgment with no knowledge of the subject vs. letting an expert, with years of training, make a medical and ethical judgment. It would be like you deciding that you can redo the electricity in your house with no training in the subject but what you've learned on the net and ignoring what an electrician tells you to do.
Any one that reads your post will come to the conclusion that you're talking about the flu shot with regards to the 100% not effective. But we'll clarify. Do you believe that the flu shot is 100% not effective and, if that's the case, why would you put something in regarding a "treatment" being 100% not effective means 100% not needed.
Also, your analogy is terrible because one can easily see the difference between a child screaming to make it warmer vs. screaming in pain. You don't even bother to show how my logic would lead to such a conclusion... and you complain about strawmen arguments or nitpick details in mine?
You see, you actually have an extremely limited view of the world and a very troubling one. You've decided that vaccines aren't worth it. But, when given huge amounts of evidence to the contrary, you simply ignore the studies that were done or the data presented. What's rather troubling from a scientific perspective is your insistence on nitpicking every detail of an argument you don't like, but not bothering to put your own arguments under the same rigor. You try to draw analogies without actually showing how they're similar, you then try to state that someone's logic would come to a particular conclusion without actually showing how, and finally, you try to say your statement doesn't mean something anyone reading your argument would think it means.
So, let's take both of the answers to the question of vaccine effectiveness. Is the vaccine 100% ineffective? If you believe that, you'd be contradicting your previous posts. If you don't believe that it's 100% ineffective but instead somewhat effective, the prevention of deaths or sickness from the disease should be weighed against the side effects. Thus far you have given not one source or number for % of people affected with the adverse side effects. This is the major problem with your entire premise. You complain about other people not citing sources or ask things like "what study has shown this", but give none of your own sources or studies, nor any values to back up claims with regards to the problems with the side effects.
Here is a proper way to try to make the statement that adverse side effects of the flu vaccine are real.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/01/20/sanofi-flu-idUSN2012404820110120
42 cases of reported seizures. If you actually bothered to do your research you might state that this is an increase above normal seizures. However, if you further did your research you would note the number of injections of flu shots in children total during that time. I'll let you find that number since this should really be your argument.
You might also realize that association =/= causation. Unfortunately, this is the most common mistake most of the anti-vaccine crowd makes with such possible side effects. You might even decide to do a bit of research with regards to such seizures and find that roughly 1 in 25 kids have at least one of these seizures.
http://www.parenting.com/article/on-call-the-facts-about-fevers-and-seizures
We could probably learn from this that demonstrating that those 42 cases out of an extremely large number of vaccinations that were actually caused by the vaccine would require far more hand waving then you've demonstrated.
If you went even further with this, you would run into this website which says that no association in adults have been seen.
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/Vaccines/MMRV/qa_FebrileSeizures.html
You might also run into sources stating that there hasn't been associations in the past with regards to these seizures and vaccines. (You're going to have to actually read the sources this time to find this bit of information in one of them).
Also, as a side note, if you're going to argue that someone's logic is flawed because they didn't take into account the age of the population studied, you should really put into your argument that the possible association with these seizures has only been seen in children and not adults. See, here's another example of the lack of rigor in your posts and arguments. If you presented these arguments in this manner to any field of science, you would be dismissed as a nay-sayer with no data to back up your denials of the current research.
Again we see the silliness of your posts. You talk and post about how the vaccine shouldn't be used due to the small benefit if any it has but, then go on tirades regarding the side effects when the side effect has a % of occurring that's orders of magnitude lower then the number of flu cases the vaccine is predicted to prevent. Even if we use the lower end numbers for cases prevented. See previous post for some examples of the chance of getting such side effects.
Finally, with regards to seat-belts... Once again you make an incorrect statement that is easily disproven. Seat belts can indeed harm you before you get into a motor vehicle accident. These strangulations could even happen in the driveway. (Oh wait, maybe you're going to claim you didn't mean motor vehicle accident in your post...it wouldn't be the first time). Here we go with some reports about the "dangers" of wearing a seat-belt.
Case of a kid almost getting strangled to death
http://www.uslaw.com/library/Personal_Injury_Law/Maryland_Boy_Almost_Strangled_Death_Seat_Belt.php?item=326046
A boy actually dying...
http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=92017
A kid dying using the latch system for seatbelts
http://www.pacificaworld.com/forum/index.php?topic=337.0
5 year old boy almost dies
http://www.imperfectparent.com/topics/2008/12/18/boy-strangled-by-seat-belt/
I like this website, it demonstrates how this process can happen to children and steps you can take to reduce the likelihood of strangulation.
http://thecarseatlady.blogspot.com/2010/04/prevent-strangulation-yet-another.html
So, as before, we can now see how the seat-belt analogy is a perfectly valid one. Even outside of a MVA, you can be harmed by a seat-belt when it's performing its non-crash function. One could further argue that during non-accidents the seat-belt is completely worthless and causes a chance of harm with no benefit for the majority of people wearing one. Granted, the chance of harm is extraordinarily small. Far smaller then the benefit of wearing a seat-belt or having your kids wear one.
Now, we can see why this analogy is perfectly fine. Seat-belts don't appear to provide a benefit outside an accident. Sometimes seat-belts don't save your life in an accident. Vaccines don't have a positive effect unless you were exposed to the flu virus and even then you have a chance of still getting the flu. Seat-belts have a small chance of harming you both in and outside of an accident. Vaccines have a small chance of harming you both when you catch and don't catch the flu virus. But, for both cases, the chance of benefit of the preventative measure is far higher when compared to the risk of injury in either case. When you take statistics of this across large numbers of people, you find that a you prevent more deaths and accidents/sicknesses with a strategy that has a good cost/benefit ratio. Trying to further nitpick details about differences in the two examples such as "oh those were kids, maybe they moved their seat-belt", or "some of them were driving instead of being parked in a driveway", or "maybe the seat-belt was put on improperly" would just demonstrate that you have a very poor understanding of analogies and their purpose.... That would most likely be the case given your bath water analogy....
It seems to me that Robert is probably a Michelle Bachmann supporter.
I support medical choice,health freedom, and full informed consent on the ACTUAL neccessity, effectiveness, and dangers of medicine that the CDC/corporate driven agendas are driveling out.
The flu shot is not necessary. And as has been shown by old and recent scientific literature it doesn't work very well. It has almost zero effectiveness in the frail elderly and immunocompromised. This is the group for whom the CDC used statistics to sell(fear) the vaccine. For the healthy, the group 100 people would have to take the vaccine to prevent 1.5 CASES. This is cases not deaths. Healthy people generally don't die from the flu or any infectious diseases for that matter.
Once again, Robert is making false claims... Notice how he didn't actually back up any of his statements while demanding so of others. Nor is he able to tell the difference between actual 0 and a small percent. The small percent becomes far more important when looking at the total number of people. Your final sentence actually says quite a bit about your lack on knowledge in this area.... See, you make claims about most people not dying from infectious disease without any citations for your point. Also, you neglect to recognize that small percents equate very large numbers of people given the population of a country. This further proves my original point regarding how fortunate we are that you don't make scientific policy.
I only need a citation if you doubt what I say or don't believe me. Is that true . Do you doubt that most people don't die of infectious disease before OR after vaccine era? CAuse I can show you that you're wrong if you'd like.
No I don't. What if 50 people died from a disease but most them had comorbidities, do you think that 6 billion need the vaccine to "protect" the when they actually didn't need the protection.
multiple people in my office took a flu shot an most got sick. i also saw where Jimmy Fallon tweeted that he took the shot and got sick too.
ill take my chances, and not take it thank you.
I used to have to get one every year and it didn't affect me. Now that I don't have to get one, I'm too lazy to bother. I guess the joke will be on me if I ever get the flu!
Why not wait and see if there is a larger problem looming with this years vaccine? Remember the Swine flu debacle etc.?
The only time I ever had the flu was when I was in grammer school. I've never had a flu shot in my life, and I have no plans of getting one any time in the near future. My immune system is in fighting shape, thank you very much!
I feel validated in how much my flu shot hurt this year! I even got a nasty bruise as proof.
I also wanted to mention that I get a flu shot every year and have NEVER become sick after getting the shot, and this year was no different. Get a flu shot, it's worth it!
If you are getting a bruise, the person who gave it to you didn't do a very good job!
My flu shot hurt as well this year for 3 days. I took 2 325mg. aspirins and that took care of the pain about every 6 hours. I know not everyone can take aspirin. I also have never had the flu. My Dad who's 77 yrs. old said his flu shot didn't bother him.
I agree with amyinaoaktown. Last year a 'pharmaceutical technician' at CVS gave me my shot...thought she put a knife in my arm...OUCH! This year it was a Dr. So-and-so at CVS administering the shots and it was a non-event. :)
Had mine already...and no, didn't hurt any more than it did last year with little or no side effects. Arm was a tad sore, but it was last year.
Never gotten the flu nor the shot, I prefer not to sign up and get needles jabbed in my arms.
i thought it hurt less this year. maybe it depends on who is giving it
That really wouldn't make a difference...it is not that difficult to give a flu shot.
Smarty_Pants, I graciously disagree. I've had nurses and techs give me shots and insert IVs, some make it feel like they are hammering a nail into you, others you have to look to see if they are actually finished.
It hurt more because the needle hit a tiny skin nerve, period. It caused a bruise because the needle hit a tiny skin capillary, period. What wusses.
Hmmmmm, hurts alot longer than previous flu shots, causes more swelling and bruising. I wonder if this "flu shot" contains more than just antibodies..........RFID chip perhaps? hmmmmmmmmmm. I think I'll skip it.
I think you are paranoid.
I don't believe for a second that if you received the vaccine last year, you won't have a sufficient immune response this year. However, I didn't receive the flu vaccine nor the separate H1N1 flu vaccine last year, so I opted for it this year. It didn't hurt one bit. I believe in the importance of many vaccines (but not all), but it's funny how they try to scare us and convince us all to get a flu shot every single year. They always end up throwing a ton of vials away; I think they just want to minimize that waste.
We got the flu shot at our local Costco, and it didn't hurt at all (no tenderness or soreness), unlike in previous years.
No, it depends on who gives it. This is another way into scaring people not to get it. We are not babies - go get your flu shots and stay well.
TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE ADVICE!
You do NOT take NSAIDS when you get a flu shot? Ever hear of Reyes Syndrome?
Tylenol, maybe, but NEVER aspirin, ibuprofen when taking something that has a virus in it, like a flu shot.
Thanks for telling me this I didn't know. The nurse told me to take aspirin if I had any discomfort.
There should be no problem using an NSAID to relieve the discomfort of a flu shot. Reyes is associated with aspirin usage in conjunctions with a viral infection. It is generally only seen in children. The flu shot contains no live virus. If you have concerns about Reyes, check the information on reliable med sites. :-)
There was a study done that showed Tylenol blunted the effects of the vaccine becaused it interfered with the immune system. (tylenol was given for fever prevention and to reduce febrile seizures caused by vaccine). The scientists also speculated that NSAIDS may do the same thing.
Giving babies Tylenol may blunt vaccine effects
Finding knocks common advice for parents looking to curb fever after shots
One study showed that animals with the flu that were given acetominophen had a higher mortality rate.
Why do people take the risk of these untested and possible very unsafe flu vaccines. There is no proof so why do you do it...You think it works because you didn't get the flu??? Heck no...I don't get the shot and I don't get the flu either...but I won't experience weird side effects like possibly you people who get the shot and thinks it's from something else. You inject weird chemicals into your body you are the only one who will pay..I don't care if they pay you..I suggest you and especially your innocent children should not be forced to get these very unproven shots. But every one has free will..Choose what you will...but at least educate yourself on the risks of these UNPROVEN flu shots!!
We had this philosophical discussion at work last week: The company provides flu shots on site free to employees. But, as in these posts, there are always those who refuse because they don't trust it, are afraid of needles and a variety of other reasons. If these people come down with influenza, should the company be required to give them paid time off. Should their vaccinated co-workers be required to work overtime to make up for their absence. Who should be responsible for all those preventable medical bills?
PS Most of the people I know who say the shot made them sick describe their symptoms as vomiting and diarrhea. They think influenza (the flu) is the same as a 24 hour gastrointestinal virus (the stomach flu).
Wait a second. You are advocating your company spending money to prevent a disease that may never occur, yet you are concerned about a company having to pay for an employee that takes a sick day because they didn't take that flu shot? That flu shot still costs money, whether or not they are free to you. Just because the flu shot exists, DOES NOT mean it makes the flu preventable in all people and cases. There are many strains of the flu that are resistant to the current flu shot.
Let's say you have 10k employees, and each shot costs them $25. That costs the company a quarter of a million dollars. Let's say that 10% of those people don't take the shot. That saves the company $25,000. 1% of the 10% get sick with the flu because they didn't take the shot. They each miss an average of 3 days, and get paid an average of $40k annually. That's $5k the company spent to pay those employees for their sick time, saving them $20k.
People can make a greater impact on the flu virus by washing their hands when they are sick, and staying away from public places (school, work, whatever) where you can spread the virus.
It sounds to me like you had a discussion with a bunch of people who are more concerned about employees being at work, than them being happy and well.
Left you forgot the opportunity loss when people miss work, the loss of production when people miss work, and the loss of production when other people have to divert attention to cover someone who has missed work. All of this costs a business major moolah, a lot more than simple wages/salaries. If your company has 10k employees and millions, probably not a big issue. For the majority of American small business, one person out one day can severely limit productivity and lost revenue.
Reye syndrome is only associated with aspirin use and viral illness. NSAIDs have not been linked, but be sure you are really taking NSAIDs and not an aspirin like medicine - key word salicylate. Thats the one to avoid. 19 years old and younger. (16 years old if diagnosed with Kawasaki disease) Adults are ok.
I get one every year and this is the first time it was totally pain free - during and after. Something to be said for getting it at your doctor's office by a nurse vs. the folks working the pharmacy at the local drug stores.